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This Summer in Greece we decided we wanted to bring our Stand Up Paddle boards with us from the UK on the plane. With hire of SUP’s at resort easily being €15 an hour for one board, we looked into the cost and the practicality of bringing the Paddle Boards with us.

What weight can the Paddle Boards be to take on the plane?

We flew with Easyjet so this is based on our experience and the cost with them.

SUP’s/Stand Up Paddle Boards are classed as Small Sports Equipment if they weigh up to 20kg and can be added to your luggage allowance at an extra cost. Each person on the booking can add one piece of small sports equipment to their booking.

If your SUP weighs more than 20kg it will be classed as Large Sports Equipment and incurs an additional fee.

Our boards – The EZ Shopper weighs just 7kg. The Portofino SUP 7.8kg. I added life jackets and other waterproof kit to the bags as this didn’t effect the weight too much and definitely didn’t increase the size of the bags. I also added the lilos and other inflatables to these bags.

So how much did it cost to bring the Paddle Boards on the plane?

With Easyjet it cost us £37 each way per board to take the Paddle Boards on the plane. So £148 to take both. I worked out that we would only need to take the Paddle Boards out 6 x during our trip for this cost to make sense.

If you’re travelling for a week then this cost might not make sense, but we are lucky enough to be in Greece for a few weeks this Summer so the cost benefit analysis worked.

Checking in the SUP’s at the airport

This was an easier process than I thought it would be, and in fact meant we had an in-person check in rather than a machine. The bags were simply tagged and then taken to the large luggage drop off.

How do you fit the Stand Up Paddle boards in the car with the holiday luggage?

This is the downside to taking the SUP’s on holiday with you. You have to work out how you are going to fit the SUP’s in the car with the other luggage you are taking.

We had discussed straps to strap the bags to the roof, but in the end purchased a portable soft luggage storage roof box that a friend had recently purchased. We bought this in time for this trip but it’ll be used for all sorts of trips in the future. It snugly fit the two paddle boards we had brought on the plane, and whilst I can’t say it was fun using this for the first time outside the airport in 33° (read not fun at all!!) it did work and safely transported both paddle boards to our accommodation. The one below is the one that we used and fit both our paddle boards in.

What Paddle Boards do we have and which did we bring on the plane?

Whether the Paddle Boards will be small sports equipment or large sports equipment will depend on the type of board and obviously the airline you are flying with.

We have three paddle boards but obviously chose to take the two smaller ones with us.

We took the Kids Inflatable Stand Up Paddle Board from EZ Shopper and the Portofino 10ft SUP Inflatable Stand Up Paddle Board.

The EZ Shopper weighs just 7kg. The Portofino SUP 7.8kg.

For other Kids Paddle Boards check out this post.